2nd would look better without the black. you can still make it work (was actually considering a border like that for mine)

I'm not saying I don't like the huge borders, but it doesn't fit with such a small render (not meaning that the size of the render is small, but the amount of the render you're fitting into such a small canvas makes it look small). If you had a render that was focused more on the head and chest, it could work better (IMO). :]